


A Christmas Tale

by eriah211



Category: Primeval
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Attempt at Humor, Christmas, M/M, Nobody is Dead, Relationship Issues, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 20:06:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20069821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eriah211/pseuds/eriah211
Summary: It's Christmas Eve, but things aren't going exactly as planned for Ryan.





	A Christmas Tale

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks a lot to the awesome fififolle for the beta, all remaining mistakes are mine. Lyle belongs to the wonderful fredbassett and he does a cameo in this because I love him and Lester so much. Written for primeval_denial Secret Santa 2018 for nietie.
> 
> Previously posted on livejournal in 2018.

Ryan had to admit that Lorraine had made a great job hanging the Christmas decorations in the ARC that year. She had chosen elegant blue and silver tinsel, which was hanging around the atrium, the offices upstairs and the break room, and there was a matching big Christmas tree with silver ornaments that stood right by the ADD.

It was simple but beautiful and it should have helped people to get into the Christmas mood, but even though the decorations were there, the spirit of the season was completely missing in the ARC the days before Christmas.

A dark cloud seemed to have been looming over everybody lately. Lester was in a very bad mood after a particularly awful meeting with the PM and everybody was avoiding him as if their jobs depended on it. Abby had caught Connor reading her personal files again and she was giving him the silent treatment, which was the reason why Connor was moping around with a kicked puppy look on his face all the time.

On the other hand, Cutter had also managed to really piss Jenny off a few days ago. It probably had something to do with Helen popping in once again to mess with her ex-husband, but Ryan wasn’t going to ask any of them about it. If the loud tapping of her high-heels was any indication, Jenny was to be avoided for now as well, and Cutter, well, the sometimes absent-minded professor probably hadn’t guessed yet what exactly he had done wrong, judging by the puzzled look on his face whenever Jenny gave him the cold shoulder.

Then there was Stephen and Ryan’s own mess, their first big fight. When Stephen had heard Helen had reappeared, he had tried to rush to find her and Ryan had used his authority as head of security to stop him, which had led to an ugly argument. Stephen had complained that Ryan was being unreasonable and jealous and Ryan had denied it and claimed he was just trying to keep him safe. Now that Ryan had had time to reflect on it, though, he had to admit to himself that jealousy had played a part in the issue, but he wondered if it might be already too late to apologize.

They had planned to spend their first Christmas Eve together at Ryan’s place, but after their argument, Stephen had called it off and Ryan had volunteered to cover the night shift on Christmas Eve so some other lad could be home with their families. So there he was, the afternoon before Christmas, admiring the decorations in a mostly empty ARC instead of being at home, cooking a delicious dinner for his boyfriend. It was a bit depressing, but he guessed it could be worse.

Then the anomaly alert went off.

***

Barely two hours later, Ryan was back at the ARC, and Lester, who somehow was still in the building despite it being so late, had asked Ryan to inform him of their return right away.

Ryan had dreaded that moment, but it was probably better done sooner rather than later, he thought. He took a deep breath and knocked on Lester’s door.

When he went inside, Ryan saw Lester’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise, but to his credit, the man composed himself immediately and just looked at Ryan seriously as he leant back in his chair.

“I was informed the anomaly opened not too far away,” Lester said. “Any incidents I should know about?”

“The anomaly was located in the garage of a residential tower block about 30 minutes away,” Ryan confirmed. “We found it without much trouble and locked it immediately. After a thorough check, we found no signs of any incursion of any kind,” he simply added. “The anomaly weakened after roughly half an hour and then closed completely.”

Lester looked at him expectantly, obviously waiting for him to continue, but Ryan stayed quiet.

Lester sighed dramatically. “You’re going to make me ask you about it, aren’t you?” he said. “OK, then: what about all that glitter and tinsel, Captain? Did you and your men happen to walk into a wild Christmas party while searching for the anomaly?”

Ryan had tried, quite unsuccessfully, to clean himself a bit before getting in the car for their trip back, but even if the remaining glitter that was all over him hadn’t been telling enough under the bright lights of Lester’s office, he was sure the small pieces of bright-coloured tinsel that were still stuck to his black uniform would have given him away immediately.

“No, sir, as I said, we found the anomaly quite easily,” Ryan clarified. “But while we were checking the building to see if any creature had come through the anomaly, we found, erm, some minor problems.”

Lester raised an eyebrow and waited patiently for Ryan to continue.

“It looks like some kids in the block had got ready a few traps to catch Santa tonight and we just walked into them,” Ryan finally added, a bit mortified.

A twitching on Lester’s jaw was the only indication that he was holding back a laugh, but Ryan noticed anyway. Lester even had to clear his throat before asking more questions, which Ryan wasn’t exactly looking forward to answer.

“So you and your men walked into some Santa traps then,” Lester said, surprisingly still keeping a straight face. “Did you manage to identify the little vandals?”

“Yes, sir,” Ryan answered without much enthusiasm. “Four kids appeared as soon as the traps went off to see if their plan had been successful.”

“The traps weren’t too dangerous, I hope.”

“Mostly bombs of glitter and glue,” Ryan explained. “But they also used some wire traps disguised with tinsel in a few places.”

When they had walked into the heavily decorated hall and had got closer to the Christmas tree that was there, they had been spattered with glue and then the balloons full of glitter had burst, covering them in sparkling colours. Ryan had been trying to get some of it off his face when his foot had got stuck in a wire slipknot, which had made him trip and fall down onto the many pointy Christmas ornaments that were spread all over the floor. Not his best moment by far, he thought, cringing internally.

“It sounds like they were determined to capture the objective,” Lester said. “They had important matters to discuss with Santa, I’m guessing.”

“The leader of the little gang said they didn’t think it was fair that rich kids always get better presents, sir,” Ryan explained. “He said he didn’t believe they were that good the whole year. They wanted to ask Santa directly about that and demand some explanation.”

“It seems fair,” Lester agreed, humming. “But the measures they took to capture Santa Claus seem a bit harsh. They could have hurt the old man.”

“We warned them about that exactly, but they said Santa was magical and surely if he can go down the chimneys despite his size, a bit of glue and wires couldn’t hurt him permanently.”

“That’s good reasoning, actually, we have to give them that,” Lester said, looking a bit impressed. “Initiative, teamwork and determination. We should keep an eye on them, Captain, they could be interesting assets for the ARC in a few years.”

Ryan glared at him. It was good to see that their mess had got him out of his bad mood, but he wasn’t so happy about being the butt of the joke.

“Well, Captain, I won’t keep you any longer, I’m sure you want to take a shower as soon as possible,” Lester said, waving his hand dismissively towards the door. “I do expect a complete and detailed report about this mission, though. It looks like this one will be entertaining reading, for a change.”

Ryan walked out of the office, only partially relieved. He knew that wasn’t the last time he was going to have to hear about this, it was too good to let it simply pass up like that.

A sudden flash of light in the corridor made Ryan turn around to find Lyle a few metres away, grinning broadly as he put his phone into his pocket.

“I’ve just talked to the lads and they told me about it,” Lyle said as he walked closer. “Kids these days respect nothing!”

Ryan frowned at Lyle’s cheerful tone, but he knew that if roles were reversed, he would be poking fun at him too.

“What are you doing here anyway, Lyle?” Ryan asked, ignoring the teasing.

“I am waiting for Lester to finally call it a day, but he doesn’t want to go until he finishes some paperwork that half-wit PM asked for,” Lyle replied.

“Every time I suggest to him to go home he tells me to fuck off, but with those polite and fancy words of his. I’m starting to think I’ll have to call for Christmas dinner takeaway or simply get him out of his office by force.”

“Before you try that, go ask him again, I think he’s in a better mood now. You’re welcome, by the way,” Ryan said and then he patted him hard on the shoulder, spreading a nice amount of glitter over Lyle’s leather jacket.

Ryan heard Lyle curse loudly as he walked away and that finally managed to put a smile on his face for the first time in the whole day.

***

Glitter was as much of a pain to wash away as expected and after almost 15 minutes in the showers, trying to scrub it off, Ryan walked out to see in the mirror that there were still many sparkling dots in his hair and face.

He cleaned the cuts he got on his arm when he fell over the pointy ornaments in the hall, put on some sweatpants and a sweater and headed towards the break room to hopefully spend the rest of his shift in peace.

He turned on the tv as he sat down on the sofa and, to his delight, the black and white images of It’s a Wonderful Life appeared on the screen. Ryan loved that movie, he used to watch it every Christmas, whenever his eventful professional life allowed it, and cheesy as it was, it always made him feel better.

‘Look, Daddy. Teacher says, 'Every time a bell rings an angel gets his wings,’ the little girl was saying.

Just great, Ryan thought, it was already ending, he wasn’t even going to get to see the movie this time.

“What fucking shit!” Ryan blurted out.

“Well, that was unexpected,” Stephen said, walking in. “I thought everybody liked this movie.”

Ryan stood up, surprised. “Stephen, what are you doing here?”

“I’ve been thinking and I wanted to talk to you about...” Stephen started, but he stopped mid-sentence. “Is that glitter in your hair?” Stephen asked, bewildered.

“Long story,” Ryan said, not sure Stephen would want to stay long enough to hear it all. Conversations that started with ‘I’ve been thinking’ didn’t usually go so well after a fight.

“And you got hurt today?” Stephen asked, frowning.

Ryan followed Stephen’s gaze to see that some of the scratches on his upper arm had started bleeding again and were staining the sweater red.

“Part of that long story, but nothing serious, really,” Ryan said. “I probably should have patched it before, but I didn’t think the cuts were that deep...”

“Let me help you with that,” Stephen asked with a serious look on his face.

It was nothing Ryan couldn’t do on his own and they both knew it, but Ryan nodded and simply took the sweater off as Stephen went to fetch the first aid kit and then he started cleaning the cuts carefully.

“You said you’ve been thinking,” Ryan told him after a while. “About what?”

Ryan was dreading the answer, but avoiding it wasn’t going to do him any good.

“About us,” Stephen said slowly. “About that stupid fight we had and about how much of a brat I’ve been. I shouldn’t have cancelled our dinner tonight like that.”

Relief flowed through Ryan as he realised Stephen wasn’t going to break up with him.

“To be honest, I’ve been thinking about that too and you were right, I was, in fact, a bit jealous,” Ryan admitted. “I think I just didn’t want to admit it, even to myself.”

“Maybe we were both a bit stupid then,” Stephen offered while he used a few butterfly bandages to close the cuts.

“I think we probably were,” Ryan agreed.

As he finished bandaging his arm, Stephen looked up at Ryan with the brightest blue eyes he had ever seen and Ryan couldn’t help himself. He leant forward to kiss him thoroughly.

When they eventually parted for air, Stephen looked at him with a playful smile on his face.

“You still haven’t told me about the glitter,” he said.

“It’s a long story,” Ryan repeated. “But I could tell you about it over dinner, if you want to stay. I have some microwave pasta to share and I think there is a bit of plum cake left in the fridge too.”

“I would love to, sounds delicious,” Stephen said.

They kissed some more before they decided to try the pasta and they laughed and talked about many things through the night. And no other anomaly alert bothered them on the first Christmas night they spent together.

END


End file.
